Lucas Leidinger; Piano; Daniel Daemon, SaxophoneRecorded 24/25th March 2017 at a church in Cologne

The album is a combination of spontaneous and previously written pieces, the whole being suffused with the players’ joint sense of music. It’s five years since they recorded together – in quartet format, Limited Impossibilities, 2012.

Although the opening ‘Icelandic Sunset’ is said to replicate the vastness of the Icelandic landscape with a suggestion of melancholy, I found it much warmer than that and truly welcoming. It’s followed by ‘Life in a Box of Glass’. Is that an Icelandic vista too? No matter – the pianist has prepared his piano so that glassy qualities may be produced and these in turn seek resolution from the saxophone.

The very short album, 11 tracks but just about 34 minutes in all, ends with ‘Mit Ari’ dedicated to the pianist’s newly born son and performed as a solo.

This finale is a very gentle piece, as quiet as is the album as a whole, and reflecting the very personal nature of the music and the close relationship between the two musicians. It is pleasing to listen to music that clearly demonstrates that the scored and the unprompted can more than happily live side by side.